Kriti Mehrotra
It was January 14, 1995, when 31-year-old schoolteacher Mary Catherine Edwards was found heinously murdered over the bathtub in her own home, leaving her entire family shaken to their core. She was actually discovered by her parents as they went to check up on her after she uncharacteristically failed to show up at a family lunch, only for that image to be one they still can not erase from their minds. However, arguably the worst aspect of this entire ordeal, as also explored in CBS’ ’48 Hours: Tracking the Killer of Mary Catherine Edwards,’ is that it took nearly three decades for her perpetrator, Clayton Bernard Foreman, to face justice.
Clayton Bernard Foreman Reportedly Had a Fixation With the Police and Their Tools
Born in the early 1960s as one of two brothers, Clayton Foreman grew up as a Texas native through and through, resulting in the values of sports and hard work being instilled in him from an early age. However, as the years passed by, he also developed an interest in the police force as well as all the tools they used, unaware that it would soon become a dark, terrible fixation. In fact, according to court records, he had helped a 19-year-old girl whose car had gotten stuck one fateful night in 1981 under the pretense of being a cop, only to then suddenly tie her hands behind her back, threaten to cut her throat if she didn’t comply, take her home, and take advantage of her in the worst of ways.
As per the victim’s own testimony, while raping her, Clayton said “Stop crying. I’m sorry. I hope I didn’t hurt you.” Yet, because it didn’t do anything to negate his selfish, heinous actions, she went to the police to report him, unaware he would only be given probation and a fine upon being found guilty. At this point, the girl was a recent graduate of Forest Park High School, where Clayton served as the manager of the football team. This is the same school Mary Catherine Edwards had attended, but he was already a senior when she was a freshman. Nevertheless, as time passed, he fell in love with one of Mary’s friends, Dianna Coe, with whom he tied the knot in 1982.
According to reports, Mary was one of the bridesmades at the wedding, and while Dianna had heard about the rape allegation against Clayton, she didn’t believe it because of how in love she was. He had managed to explain the situation away to his then-finace by asserting it was just a big misunderstanding, which she accepted rather easily as she thought that if he had indeed raped someone, why was he not in prison. Thus, they happily married in a small ceremony, following which they settled down and even welcomed a son, that is, until time took its toll on them over 11 years later. Dianna was the one to file for divorce following years of lies about finances and an affair.
Clayton Foreman Was Arrested Thanks to the Advancements in DNA Technology
No one had any idea that around 3 years after Clayton’s divorce from Dianna, Mary would be found dead over her bathtub, with investigators initially believing she had been drowned. That’s because she was naked and had obviously been sexually assaulted while her hands had been handcuffed behind her back – these cuffs were evidently police grade. Thankfully, all the evidence from the scene was preserved carefully, so when DNA technological advancements proved to be great to solve old cold cases, the Sheriff’s Office immediately revised Mary’s 1995 homicide too. This was 2018, as all previous leads in connection with this matter had long died down or fizzled out.
It took a long while for investigators to find a DNA match to the one recovered from inside Mary, but once they did, they were certain with a one in 461 septillion chance (24 zeros). By this point, Clayton had long relocated from Beaumont to Reynoldsberg, Ohio, where he served as an Uber driver at the time. He was taken into custody for questioning on April 29, 2021, by the end of which he could not explain why his DNA was found inside Mary, so he asked for a lawyer. It was then that officials arrested him for the 31-year-old’s murder, more than 26 years after the fact, and they got special permission from the DA’s office to put him in the same handcuffs that had bound Mary.
Clayton Foreman is Currently Serving His Time Behind Bars
Clayton Foreman stood trial for the charges against him in March 2024, wherein the prosecutors painted a picture of him as a predator who got gratification from the pain of others. They backed this with testimonies from Mary’s loved ones, his 1981 rape survivor, and 2 other women who had been scared as well as scarred by him at one point or another. While one was his former fiancée, who had found pictures of young girls in his possession, only for him to allegedly claim he liked fantasizing about taking their virginity, the other was his co-worker and junior, who had found a pair of handcuffs in his drawer. All these women made it clear that he made them feel unsafe and traumatized them.
Another alleged victim of Clayton also came forward to testify against him, alleging he had attacked her from behind and put a gun to her head before taking advantage of her, but she never reported him. In the end, with the defense presenting no argument, it took the jury less than an hour of deliberations to find Clayton guilty of the 1995 murder, for which he was sentenced to the maximum of 25 years to life in prison. Therefore, today, at the age of 65, he remains incarcerated at the meximum-security Texas Department of Criminal Justice – George Beto Unit, where he is expected to remain until at least 2061 when he becomes eligible for parole. Although, he will be 101 by then.
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